As a child, did you have an anxious, stressed out or angry mum?

[Muminthewest]

What was her behaviour and how did this affect you?
Was there a turning point when things got better and if so, what brought about the change, and what age were you when the change took place?
How is your relationship with your mum now?

I am worried I am this mum, I’m triggered all the time.
My children won’t be able to articulate the effect my stress might be having on them. I want to know I can turn things around and see how others have done this. I also want to know it’s not too late. My children are 8 and 5.

My Mum suffered with PND after my younger brother was born. Never treated.
She also had severe PMT and every 28 days would turn into a screaming banshee and threaten to leave.
It’s only now I realise the constant threats to leave have caused me to have no emotional attachment to her at all. She now has dementia and I feel bad for feeling nothing, but suspect it’s a result of me distancing myself from her after the constant threats.

I’m in my late fifties and my mother was unpredictable and angry. I have no doubt now that she loved us but it made me hypervigilant and I identify with many of the other emotions expressed already. I moved as far away as possible as soon as I could. We have an ok relationship now but I tell her nothing and she will never really know the real me (nor does she want to).

But what I came on to say is that she would often apologise and as a child I would think “if you’re always so sorry afterwards, why do you keep doing it”. It made me crosser tbh.

if you are sorry, apologise but make some changes so it doesn’t happen again.

Children don't remember the content of what is said, but they do remember the general tone.

I’m a grandmother now but I was an anxious & stressed out mum. I was rarely an angry mum (basically because women weren’t allowed to get angry, so I think it was mostly internalised). When I did get angry I did apologise to my kids and own it. That was not something parents were encouraged to do really, btw. So, I’m glad I had the intuition. and feeling to do it - It was remembering how I felt as a child that caused me to apologise I think.

I did seek out help for stress/anxiety/depression but the help wasn’t good - nothing was ever addressed satisfactorily really. And my extended family were too busy to help me. My own parents never admitted to being wrong so there has been progress over the generations.

There were no forums like these obviously, and these forums do allow for more honesty (and I think support) than you’d get from talking to other young mums back then. No one ever wanted to admit to feelings of failure as a parent because there was so much judgement. There still is judgement, but social changes and internet forums and the study of the childhood years etc., has made it so there is more acceptance. ( have seen judgy posters on parenting forums, but from my observations, other posters usually jump on them.).

There are no perfect parents. Parenting is the hardest job in the world. There seems to be a bit more psychological and practical support these days, and generally women are not so isolated at home. But now, also, they are doing all the jobs and peoples real wages have gone backwards for 3 decades while cost of living has continued to increase. It’s a lot now. It was a lot back then too - but in a different way.

I had an angry mum a lot of the time.

Her and my dads marriage ended when I was 4. She was extremely depressed and has a bit of trauma from childhood and some issues between her and my DF. So when he left, it got worse and I was getting older so noticed it more.

I remember vividly one day me and sibling didn't "tidy" for her and she came home and put her foot through a mirror. Was definitely traumatic. This was just a never ending cycle of my mum behaving this way. She would also disappear and leave us with my DF quite a lot, or a baby sitter.

She was only ever happy if she was in a relationship. It was a relief to be honest because then she was somewhat nice to be around.

However she did prioritise her partners over her children and as a result her and my siblings relation became strained and they left our home stayed with our father and didn't speak to my mum for years.

I also ended up moving in with my DF.

I went to therapy in my late twenties/early thirties and this definitely helped so much. I didn't realise how much trauma I had and was holding onto.

Now me and my sibling are older and have children, my mum is re married and settled, she's a completely different woman. She definitely knows that she's done wrong in the past and has apologised and is still trying to make up for it to this day. She's also an incredible gran, and we all have a much better relationship.

I had an angry, stressed one. She had a hair trigger and we were constantly terrified of doing something wrong, I’m still uncomfortable with accidentally spilling, making a noise or taking up space. She came in the door from work shouting every single day.

I never felt comfortable asking her for anything because I knew it was an inconvenience and she’d get cross. She did everything for our basic survival needs, food, housing, school etc but she didn’t have the bandwidth to be interested in our (especially my) life in terms of friends, hobbies, emotional struggles etc. We weren’t really allowed friends over, the kitchen was off-limits outside mealtimes, we had an early bedtime compared to our peers etc. She did always make sure we had lovely Christmases though, which is why it’s my favourite time of year.

As an adult, I understand why. Her life didn’t turn out the way she wanted. She was ditched for another woman by my POS father who left her with two preschoolers and a mortgage before she was 30. He continued to lie and cheat and try to get out of paying maintenance our whole lives. She was bitter and angry and stressed out. I’ve been in therapy for years because of it, and I know she feels bad. It’s only really over the past 10 years that she’s understood. I think that realisation came from one of my sibling’s friends saying quite innocently when we were talking one night “oh god, you were the scary Mum in the street! We were all terrified of you!” She had no idea.

I had a violent angry father and a highly anxious, emotionally checked out narcissistic mother. I am no contact with my father, low contact with my mother.

Get yourself into counselling or CBT op. You can fix those triggers. You can repair your relationship at this point, you can be gentle, calm and patient but you need take care of your own needs. You can’t continue as you are. Consider seeing the GP and put in place lots of support. There is so much available once you start looking.

whatever happened to you is having a huge impact on you now. For your children’s sake do this.

I was a calm and loving parent, despite my own upbringing. I decided I could not live in a shouty place and there was nothing my children could do to make me angry and shout, if I felt angry I would recognise it was ‘my stuff’ take a deep breathe, and a minute and then address dc calmly. It took a lot of self control some days especially when I was tired. I read lots of books with alternative ideas and strategies. I have a beautiful relationship with my xx - all adult m/teens now.

It starts by recognising and looking after your own needs.

@Lastchancechica 👍.
💐 to everyone for offering good - hard earned -advice.

My mum was terrifying when I was younger. I remember struggling to eat as my hands were shaking so much. The slightest of things used to trigger her off and I dreaded her coming home. Weirdly I’m more angry with my dad as an adult as he left her with lots of young kids and didn’t try share custody of us even though he knew what she was like. I’m sure having every other weekend off would have relieved the stress.
In retrospect it would have been better if she worked part time and we’d had less hobbies but she played into the middle class stereotype of they must extra curricular activities and holidays. We were constantly being rushed round and had to masses of housework to help her juggle everything although that was never up to her standards.

I was terrified of my DM growing up. We were truly loved but she was feisty and knew exactly how to keep us in line!

I remember spending a lot of time outside of the house. Primary school age Id be out all day on my bike knocking for people to play with and if no one was home id just stay out rather than go home. I think my one friends mum knew something was up and was always very kind to me considering I was there a lot.
I dint hold it against my mum now as I know she had severe PMT and my dad worked long hours and away, although I did bristle when she gave me unwanted parenting advice.

Now I'm a parent the thing I don't understand is all the complexly self generated stress, I'm suspicious that my mum just enjoyed the chaos for some reason. Always running late for school etc, thing is mum had to go to work after dropping us at school, there was no way she was late to work every day like we were late to school. I honestly don't know what she was doing, I can't even drive but still get my son to school on time every single day. Sometimes I've even time for mumsnetting like today!

It was like that any time we needed to leave the house along with other self imposed things like having to leave really early in the morning to go places, I've got no issue with taking my son out in the afternoon, we sometimes even stay out till bedtime!

Going to visit her its still like this, impossible to just get up and go without tons off faffing and discussion.

My mum was very stressy and shouty. Hard to pinpoint specifically how it's effected me and why, but I will say I'm rubbish at conflict with my husband. I get very upset and have a bad habit of escalating things/sabotaging.

On the other hand my MIL is an incredibly anxious woman. She never gets angry or heated, but she's just terrified of life. My husband is an anxious person too.

This is me,I never ask for help and I rarely visit anyone because I assume I get on their nerves.
My mother hated my father and after her death(suicide) I realised he was probably autistic.I now have a son who's just like him,so while I realise that life with my father was difficult and frustrating I'll never understand why she took it out on me.

No had a lovely mum to 4 of us and now I'm the same kind of mum to my 4. I just live in zombie zone some days 3 toddlers lol but no never shouting,angry words or anything it solves nothing

Op this was me. I was working all the hours, lots of little kids, living in a stressful shitty area with high crime and loads of noise. Kid with ASD. I felt on edge 24/7 and would explode if the house was chaos or the kids wouldn’t do something simple like put a plate on the side or put shoes in the porch rather than under the sofa. I like you realised this had to change.
I have let my standards slip a bit. House doesn’t have to be perfect, ok kids are who they are I can’t force them to be academic or tidy. It’s their personality. I have stopped shouting. I get up at 5 to have an hour to myself to start the day so it doesn’t feel like demands from the minute I open my eyes. I turned off the tv so the kids play with toys. They calmed down. I have more routine, but less expectations. I have cut off my highly critical MIL who I was trying to please. I have realised I have been grieving deaths but not realising as I’d been too busy to actually let it hit me.
The atmosphere in the house has done a 180 and everyone is calmer. Treat it like an terrible addiction you have to stop. As soon as I feel anger rising now I can stop it but it took a while. You can do it, but only from a place of self compassion.
My parents were shouty and aggressive and I left home at 15. I don’t want this to be my kids.

@Muminthewest my mum was very loving but anxious a lot, she did shout occasionally too. She often seemed disappointed that I didn’t do better, she thought I could be better behaved, better in school, better hobbies (everything I liked was bad it seemed) but mostly it was a sense that she wished I was better at helping out. She wanted me to do housework and look after my siblings more, even if I did it a bit it seemed she always wanted more.

I see now that she was like this with everyone and everything. We have a good relationship now but it still hurts when she implies I’m always coming up short. She didn’t know how to make herself happy, and she was extremely hard on herself. My wish for her, and for me, is that she learn to enjoy herself and be happy. Also wished she learned that feeling guilty about how you treat people, which I know she does, doesn’t help anyone at all if anything the harder she is on herself the harder she is on everyone else too. She thinks she’s good at hiding her anger and anxiety, she is not.

So I think it’s good to be aware, but it’s not enough, I think the hard work will be finding joy and fun rather than aiming to self improve. I worry about this too with my own children by the way - so you are not alone 💐

💐this sounds so hard, I’m sorry you had to go through this

Yes and is still affects our relationship (I'm in my 50s, she in her 80s). She had spells as a psychiatric in-patient when I was small. It has manifested itself as endless stressing and fussing and worrying about us rather than anger or behaving in an abusive manner. She never stopped us doing things like school trips or driving, it was always the small stuff like going off on one if we ate eg a grape without washing it, day in day out. We are OK now, but I think it is more me being tolerant of it as I have got older, I rebelled a lot in my teens and our relationship was very bad for a few years. I still think twice about telling her anything that might worry her though, luckily I can talk to my dad. Whereas she still dumps all her worries on me. One of my primary aims as a parent has been to break this cycle for my DCs and I think on the whole it has been successful.

@WickedSerious
This is me,I never ask for help and I rarely visit anyone because I assume I get on their nerves.

Really?

Yes I always felt on eggshells around my mum. No hugs or ‘I love you’s :( got better when I left home, she’s still annoying/obliviously offensive etc. I feel sympathy with her now as as an adult I can see she was depressed. She had way more help and fewer kids than I do though!

Yes,as a child I was very close to one of my aunts and my mother told me to stop visiting her because she was 'sick of the sight of me'.

My first ever memory was fear. I was about 1 1/2. I don't remember a whole lot about that age as everyone doesn't, but I remember that. I was scared to enter to room my parents were in with my newborn brother.

Many needs weren't met emotionally and eventually I just learned there was no point. A good point is I'm extremely resilient and mental health is very good. A downside is I won't ask for help. I'm NC with my mother now and LC with the rest of them and life is better for it.

It doesn't traumatise at the time usually I don't think because it's their normal life. It's later on when kids transition through the teens that your parents reap what they have sown with their offspring. As adults they make a choice whether to continue a relationship with them and put the past to bed or not.

@WickedSerious I'm sorry, that's horrible. I think, though, your mum was lying and didn't want you to connect with the aunt. No-one was, or is, sick of you. These things cut deep though, ay?

I would also say get help now. Counselling or psychotherapy could help you. My mum was very anxious and experienced alot of trauma and grief at a young age. As a child I was unusually attuned to my mums emotions and was anxious about separation. I was very close to my mum and never viewed her negatively in any way. However I went onto develop a serious MH illness which is rooted in anxiety. All my children were affected by the way it manifested and my DD also had anxiety and a serious MH episode as an adult. She went on to have medication and some difficulties but after 3 years sought psychotherapy, after a year of treatment she has never looked back. Runs a successful company and is on no medication. I'm very close to all my children but I wish I had got treatment when younger. I hope you can seek help for any difficulties, you deserve it and your dc too. In my case I think my family suffered generational trauma.